Settings, Resettings, Repeat

The London based German artist Steffi Klenz (b. 1979) mainly deals with architecture in her photography without creating classical architectural photographs. On a meta-level the photographic image is simultaneously questioned, alienated, and recurrently appropriated. She uses archival material as well as her own images for this.

Her solo exhibition at Kehrer gallery covers a wide range from her early works of the series »Nonsuch« (2005–2006) to her current work »He only feels the black and white of it« (2016). For both her new series »Beun« (2015) and »He only feels the black and white of it« Klenz uses archival material that she alienates in very different ways. Viewers can comprehend the complete image only by putting the fragments of the single works together in their mind.

The series »Beun« (old Dutch for stage) has its origins in an American press photograph taken in a concentration camp. For »Beun« Klenz rebuilt the interior of the barrack in her studio to photograph it again afterwards. By applying different algorithms the black-and-white photographs of the series were fragmented.

In »He only feels the black and white of it« the artist also uses a press photograph from 1973 that shows a hole in the Berlin Wall. This image is also decomposed on each single screen print in diverse ways.

Recently, Steffi Klenz’s works were exhibited in the following institutions: LA Center for Digital Art, Los Angeles, US (2015); St. Albans Museums, Hertfordshire, UK (2015); Centre for Contemporary Arts, Glasgow, UK (2014);  Künstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin, DE (2013); Finnish Museum of Photography, Helsinki, FI (2012), Goethe-Institut, Glasgow, UK (2010).